All Souls Day

We are in the home stretch for Halloween and not a moment too soon. We have managed to stay our of Joanne's Fabric Store, but not without looking under couch cushion and in Sister Mary Fiacre's wheelchair for loose buttons, pieces of thread, safety pins and whatever other notions we can find to hold these costumes together. If only we were rich. If only the people who needed costumes were rich. If only someone had seventy dollars plus shipping. We could have avoided the whole thing by sending everyone here.

I'm not that big a fan of dressing children up as saints for Halloween. I think it's a little...wet blanketish. But there are a few costumes that might be fun and get the kids excited about learning more about a saint.

Here's little Kateri Tekakwitha. That's kind of fun. They left the smallpox out of the picture. And since Kateri isn't a saint yet, maybe a few kids dressing up like her will help her cause for sainthood. She could have her little brothers and sisters dress up like turtles and follow her around. I would have gone for that as a girl. When in doubt, I was always a bum.

That used to be a great costume. Now we don't have bums anymore. Just homeless people.


Little Rose of Lima is nice. I think she should have a crown made of something that looks like glass. That sort of thing was really a habit for St. Rose of Lima. Or she could have some embroidery with her or something. I always think of St. Rose of Lima as the patron saint of crafters. Her parents were hoping to marry her off to a rich fellow and when Rose dodged that idea to become a nun and live in her own backyard, she made up for the family's loss of rich husband income by making things to sell.

This Mother Teresa costume, although it is very lovely, is a wet blanket outfit for sure. We love Mother Teresa, but she's not a fun Halloween gal.

At all.


For boys, who could resist St. George, even if he is one of those highly dubious saints? I like St. George, but we know his story is...exaggerated. How do we know? Dragons, anyone? If you dress up as St. George you may as well dress up as Superman or Robin Hood. Any of those three should please any little boy.

I like this little St. John the Baptist, but after I thought about it, it seems a little embarrassing for a little boy to run around in a gunny sack with a belt and nothing else. If I were that little boy, I'd pretty much feel like I was wearing a mini skirt. Well, maybe not a mini skirt. But....you know what I mean. It's really like wearing a dress. We call this style a 'shift' isn't that right?


And on the wet blanket side, Cardinal Neumann is a fun killer. Trick or Treat!

Say, that reminds me, I read the other day that they dug Cardinal Neumann up for his cause of sainthood (it's one of the first steps) and he wasn't there. I can tell you that really struck me, because for years people have been asking me why we dig people up at all and I have explained a million times to a million people that we need to find out if the person is really there so that folks aren't standing around a vault with Joe the Plumber in it offering their prayers and petitions. So you can imagine my shock to hear that Cardinal Neumann was gone.

It was his grave and his coffin, however. He had just completely decomposed. Only his Cardinal suit was left.

Not that this costume has anything to do with that.



Today's Nun So Beautiful is from Sue, who tells us that this nun fell over because she saw the Pope.